


House Arrest

by jhoom



Series: Academy Blues [3]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: College!AU, F/M, but garrus is such an insecure mess, military academy!au, that is actually requited, unrequited pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-07
Updated: 2016-07-07
Packaged: 2018-07-22 01:48:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7413808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jhoom/pseuds/jhoom
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mass Effect AU where promising young cadets from various planets are sent to train at a military academy. And not just any academy, the academy. Those that come out the other end of this grueling training are basically on the short-list for Spectre candidacy. After years of being part of Citadel space, the first batch of human recruits are invited. Among them are Jane Shepard and Garrus Vakarian.</p><p>Based on this prompt: We passed out on your bed after playing Scrabble last night, and our limbs are completely entangled, the blankets are on the floor and I don’t think I ever want to leave.</p>
            </blockquote>





	House Arrest

**Author's Note:**

> Continuation of Academy Blues that starts up a little after part two leaves off. The next installment (whenever I get around to it) will be back to Shepard's POV. I think...
> 
> And why yes, I am doing this instead of writing the next chapter of The Mark... hopefully I'll be able to update that story this week or early next, the problem is I have to review the Leviathan mission ahead of time...
> 
> And thank you to [mordinette](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Mordinette/pseuds/Mordinette) for putting up with my errors and beta-reading for me :)
> 
> Come visit me on tumblr [@jhoomwrites](http://jhoomwrites.tumblr.com)

If you'd asked Garrus where the safest place in any system might be, near the top of the list would be the Academy.  With top notch military grade equipment for training and instructors all known for their prestigious careers, no one would dare launch an attack.  Even if somewhere else in the system were targeted, there's _no way_ they'd even _think_ about going after the Academy too.

Which was all true, he admitted to himself.   There was a batarian raid at the edge of the system - several planets over from the Academy's facilities - and they'd made no indication that they intended to move further into the system.  Yet here he was, rushing back to his dorm room and doing his best to ignore the screeching alarms ringing across the campus.  

About midday all the classes had been interrupted by the high-pitched whine (extremely grating to listen to, but it was a frequency all species could hear and would respond to appropriately).  They'd all stared at each other, wondering if it was some kind of drill they weren't acquainted with.  His instructor, a human woman with silver hair and dark skin he'd learned meant she was "tan", had gone pale and then promptly annoyed.  She'd acted quickly, filling them in on what the alarm meant and instructing them to _immediately_ head back to their rooms.  

"And yes, _your own_ rooms.  We'll be doing roll call.  You're not where you're supposed to be, there'll be hell to pay."

Given the nature of the situation, none of the students were inclined to doubt that threat.  

He pushed his way through the throngs of recruits heading in the opposite direction, nearly ran over a salarian student who seemed particularly confused and nervous.  His internal aggravation at being held up wasn't enough to outweigh the tinge of pity he felt looking into her wide eyes. Squaring his shoulders, he decided to help the obviously overwhelmed young woman back to her room.

Even rushing, he barely made it back to his room before the roll call sounded.  Shepard quirked an eyebrow at him from where she was perched at her desk, but didn't comment as a drill sergeant came by to check in on them.

"I thought this place was supposed to be safe," he growled in annoyance before slumping down on his bed to pout.  "Why are they locking us in like children?"

Shepard eyed him warily, probably trying to read his mood, before answering.  "I heard from Higgins that the fourth year and up cadets are being flown over to help deal with the raid, plus a lot of the staff. So all of us youngin's are being put under house arrest since there aren't enough of them to keep us in line if we freak out or something."

"Oh."  His shoulder slumped because that was actually kind of reasonable and reasonable didn't really give him grounds to complain.

"It still sucks ass," Shepard offered, correctly reading his sour mood.  "What's got you all broody anyway?"

He thought back to the worried salarian cadet as well as a few others who seemed more panicked than the rest.  It didn't bode well for them as future soldiers that they were so easily spooked. Something they were probably starting to realize now that they were shut in the quiet of their rooms with nothing else to do but think.  They'd have to make the decision to toughen up or switch focuses to something else. Something where it wouldn't mean life or death if they broke under the pressure.  

The second-hand pain he experienced thinking of their current turmoil sat uncomfortably in his gut.

Mouth pressed together in a firm line, he ignored Shepard's question.  Instead he reached for the nearest datapad and pretended to find the open file extremely interesting.  He could feel Shepard watching him, but soon she sighed and turned back to her own work.

Eventually Garrus did manage to focus long enough to get _some_ work done.  By his own standards, it was subpar at best, but at least it offered a distraction. Perhaps it was too effective in that regard, since he didn’t notice Shepard getting up from her desk and shuffling around in the closet.  He in fact didn't realize she's moved at all until she plopped down on his bed in front of him with a big goofy grin.

"Wanna play Scrabble?" she asks, holding up a red box with a bizarre picture on it.  

He eyes it suspiciously, wondering what form of human bonding ritual this might be.  Or if it was just some Shepard-specific way of trying to cheer him up.  "What's Scrabble?"

Shepard gaped at him, clearly torn in how to react to such sacrilege.  "You're turian, so I'm going to let that one slide.  Scrabble is only _the_ greatest board game known to man.  It requires skill, but isn't going to cause the type of in-fighting that Monopoly does.  Because honestly, fuck Monopoly and fuck my cousin for stealing Boardwalk from me."

"I have no idea what any of that means."

Her fingers tapped along the edges of the box.  It was a habit of hers whenever she was deciding how _human_ to get with him.  "We'll save the Monopoly for another day."  

Garrus was of course more than happy to follow her lead on that.  She opened the box and started taking out various pieces, spreading them on the bed and handing some over to him.  "Scrabble is a spelling game.  You gotta spell words with the letters you have.  Longer words are more points.  Words with rare letters are more points.  There are some spaces on the board that give you bonus points.  And now that I'm describing it, I'm starting to realize how nerdy this game is..."

The idea of the game was interesting and far different from the video games she'd introduced him to a few weeks ago.  Yes, that had involved strategy but it had really relied more on your understanding of the game mechanics than any actual knowledge of the historical circumstances. The nuances of this game would no doubt require careful planning as well, but it rewarded those who had useful information rather than those who had invested more time in playing the game.

As Shepard continued to set up, he found himself enjoying the prospect of playing.  Until he picked up one of the pieces, a letter neatly carved into the center of the wood block.  Heart sinking a bit, he held it up for Shepard.  "You do realize the translator compensates for a lot, right? I'm not even sure what these symbols mean or what sounds they correspond to... Or if this sound even exists in my language."

She frowned and stopped arranging the game.  "You don't know what letter that is?"

"I recognize the symbol as a letter, though I'm not familiar with the language.  I should probably point out that I don't even know _which_ human language you speak, I only know there are several.  I've seen the letter before.  But usually when I see human writing on signs or actual pieces of paper, my visor provides a translation for me.  It doesn't bother with individual letters.  A letter by itself is meaningless unless it's part of a word or acronym." He shrugged (and briefly hoped he was mimicking the human gesture correctly).  "There's nothing for it to parse out on its own.  So again, I have no clue what sound this letter actually corresponds to."

"Oh." Shepard seemed genuinely disappointed. There was a moment of hesitation before she picked up the nearest block and showed it to him.  "This is an 'S'.  It makes a 'ssss' sound."

Garrus' mandibles twitched as he listened to what the translator offered.  It sounded like nonsense.  Noise with no meaning attached.  But not wanting to burst Shepard's bubble, he repeated the sounds. "Any useful words that use that sound?"

"Oh my _god_ , Vakarian," she sputtered.  It looked like she was about to throw the game piece at him.  "My friggin' _name_ starts with an S!  What the hell do you hear when you say 'Shepard' anyway?"

"I-" but he stopped short because he didn't quite know how to answer that.  Thinking about it now gave him an idea.  He pulled up his omni-tool and switched off the translator. Shepard eyed him curiously, but her face lit up in understanding and she did the same.  A smile full of mischief, she gestured for him to go ahead. "Shepard," he said in the same exact way he'd always done.  

Shepard's eyebrows rose but she otherwise didn't comment.  "Vakarian."  And _wow_ , that was... that was different.  No subvocals added in to get the tone quite right, her voice too high pitched for any turian, and the distinct way his name sounded almost watery, like there was just too much tongue and spit and space for them to echo off of.  

His reaction must have been amusing, at least based on the laugh Shepard graced him with and...  And he might never use the translator again if _that_ was what Shepard laughing sounded like. The translator always inserted the subvocals needed to show if the laugh was genuine or not, but listening to her firsthand instilled in him the conviction that it was completely unnecessary. He could _hear_ the happiness in the melody of it.

It was beautiful.

( _Stop thinking like that, Vakarian.  We've been through this before._ )

Thankfully, with or without the translation program running, Shepard wouldn't have been able to understand the way his mandibles twitched and his eyes narrowed.  Even the best algorithms couldn't pinpoint the precise meaning of facial expressions and hand gestures - those all had to be learned the old fashioned way.  Either way, he was probably safe.  There was little to no chance she could have interpreted the fond way he'd just looked at her.

She moved to turn her translator back on and he followed suit (though mentally he had to prepare himself to make sure he could school his voice into composed neutrality). "You sound like you were gargling glass while trying to talk."

"Thank you," he answered dryly.  "You sounded like a high-pitched leaky faucet with words coming out."

And then that laugh bubbled out of her in response, making the comparison even more spot on.  

"Okay," she eventually managed to get out through giggles that wouldn't quite die out. "I think traditional Scrabble is pretty much out.  But..." And there was something mischievous in the way she looked at him before dumping all the letter blocks onto the board lying between them.  "We can still have some fun."

Grabbing the nearest tiles, she started putting them together.  Words only half-formed, his visor wasn't able to decipher much, though it did helpfully provide him with guesses of what the words might become. Somehow Shepard noticed because she grunted as she reached across the board and pulled his visor right off his head. "That's cheating," was her only explanation before shutting it off and putting it on his desk.  

"I'm not going to be able to read these without the visor-"

"I'm going to teach you, duh."  About ten words laid out, Shepard crossed her arms and smugly surveyed her handiwork. Garrus looked them over one by one, as though the meaning of the words would make themselves apparent if he merely stared long enough.  They did not, but he was able to recognize that some of them had the S letter Shepard had already pointed out to him.  

"Okay, first we should probably go over what the letters look and sound like..."  She carefully got off the bed, making sure not to jostle the gameboard, and rummaged through her desk.  She held up a pad of paper and a pen triumphantly before throwing them his way.  "We're going low tech cuz in a minute we're shutting off the translators again."

"Great."  He tried to pour as much sarcasm into the single word, but there was probably a hint of his eagerness not too underneath.

Shepard methodically went through the whole alphabet, insisting that Garrus diligently take notes. The couple times she peaked to make sure he was actually following her instructions instead of doodling, she gawked at the strange symbols he wrote after each letter.  

"I can't write notes about your language in your language."  He fidgeted in embarrassment at his own messy handwriting - both for the strange human symbols and even his native turian ones.  

"No, no I get it... They, uh... just look really cool, I guess."

Once they'd gone through each letter and their respective sounds, Shepard grinned evilly and made him shut off his translator.  They went word by word, first with Garrus attempting to sound it out and then Shepard modeling it for him.  Then of course, Shepard would prompt him to make a guess at what it meant, laughing at his choices because _her_ translator was still on and she knew every damn word they were both saying.  

Only after he'd made at least five guesses would she grab the notepad and draw out the word.  Which okay, Shepard's artist talents were a little lacking, so if he made a fool of himself by butchering her language it only seemed fair that he got to laugh at her drawings.

The first few words went pretty quickly, making them both over confident... until they got stuck on the fourth one.  She gave him a thumbs up on his pronunciation, only correcting him once, but his guesses were all wrong.  Her cocky grin disappeared though when he'd been unable to guess what her drawing was.

 

  


 

"Well, honestly, it looks like a sea creature native to Palaven, but I doubt that's what you were going for."  Her scowl told him that she very much was _not_ going for that.  "I mean, it might be some sort of helmet, but I don't know why it'd have lines coming off of it-"  She smacked him with the notepad, as if he were purposely guessing wrong.  "If you turn it this way, it could be an elcor-"  That earned him another smack, this time accompanied by an annoyed grunt and some muttering. "Okay, well I give up."

Shepard snatched a datapad off the floor and pulled up an image, showing it to him like he was an idiot for not seeing the obvious similarity.  

"That was a _ship_?" he asked, incredulous.  Shepard growled and threw the damn notepad at him, hand splayed out in a challenge for him to do any better.  Subvocals rumbling in amusement, he angled the paper so she couldn't catch a peak until it was done.  He was never much of an artist, either, but oh well.  Finished, he passed it over without a word.  

 

  


 

Her mouth immediately opened to comment, but she either remembered his translator was off or whatever she'd planned to say didn't pan out the way she'd hoped.  Instead, she huffed out a long breath in annoyance before moving on to the next set of letters.  Though she did spend a lot more time on her drawings, putting in a real effort to make them clear.  Honestly, he preferred the messy scribbles but there was something cute about the way her tongue stuck out as she tried to get the lines just right.

Towards the last few words, Shepard started fidgeting a bit where she sat cross legged on his bed. Suspicion lurked in the back of his mind as he started on the last word, which was actually one of the shorter ones. The first letter wasn't one he'd had to use yet, so he double checked his notes before sounding it out slowly with probably more precision than the task required.

"Jane."  

Her reaction was... strangely neutral.  Like she was making a pointed effort to not let her face show anything.  And that wasn't quite what he'd expected.  He nervously tried again, his voice rumbling over the word.  "Jane."  It sounded... familiar, but slightly off.  He tried again, this time using one of the variations for the vowels she'd told him. "Jane."  

Wait...

"Jane?"  He could see her eyes shining now that he'd finally recognized it.  This time with confidence, he said, "Jane Shepard."  

He switched his translator back on because Shepard's smile would blind him otherwise.  And by blind, he meant of course that he'd fall even further for this human who was well beyond his reach.  Only a few more months left in the year, then they'd be back with their families and most likely given new roommates when they came back for the next year's training.  Really, he just needed to keep it together until then.  

"How'd I do?"

"I mean, you're shit awful at pictionary, but the English was sounding good."  Her voice was a little too thick, almost strained. Before he could speculate on what that could mean, the strangeness disappeared.  "You gonna teach me some turian now?"  

They obviously didn't have the equivalent game for turian letters, so they settled against the wall and used the paper.  It was comfortable, sitting with their sides flush together and their hands occasionally brushing as they fought for the pen.  Once Shepard was sure she'd mastered the basics of the letters (she hadn't, Garrus was sure of that, but never tell Jane Shepard she was wrong unless you were willing to deal with the consequences), they shut off her translator.

Shepard managed about as well as Garrus (thank the Spirits, if she'd done worse he was sure they'd be at it all night), but had trouble with the words for "galaxy" and "table."  There were just some sounds human anatomy couldn’t reproduce, even with the best coaching.  

While he'd had his turn, Shepard had kept up a running commentary which he, of course, couldn't understand.  Her voice, un-tempered by the translator, was difficult for him to read the tone of. He'd assumed it was all encouragement, although she undoubtedly added a few jokes about his pronunciation.  

Garrus, lovesick fool that he was, did the same.

"You sound great, Shepard."

"You're doing such a good job."

But with the reality that _she couldn't understand him_ dawning upon him, it slowly progressed from there.  

"You're beautiful, you know that?  Even if you can't say the word 'table' to save your life."

"I'm pretty sure if you were turian, I'd have asked you out the first week.  But if you were turian, you wouldn't be you so I think I like it better this way."

"I think I'm not really going to be able to get over you."

They both ended up turning off their translators and going back and forth, coming up with more ridiculous sounding words and not bothering with the meanings.  

(He was certain she'd made up some of the words, like supercalifragilisticexpialidocious and disestablishmentarianism, but she'd used her datapad to prove the validity of both. He'd of course countered with equally long and complicated turian words that had Shepard balking.)

They kept talking in between, too, and Garrus loved that he was getting a chance to better know the sound of her voice unfiltered by the translators.  Tired and blissfully happy, the thought floated through his head that he'd learn English if they ever dated just so he could hear her that way all the time.  

If pressed, he wouldn't be able to tell you who fell asleep first.  Shepard's yawning started pretty early on, and eventually she'd leaned her head on his shoulder.  But they'd gone for a while after that.  Soon his eyes were drooping and he kept losing the thread of their conversation (or well... the two separate one-sided conversations that they were pretending were the same).  

But the obvious proof that they _had_ fallen asleep on each other came with the morning sun filtering through the window.  He'd stretched out only to find one of his arms weighed down and his legs tangled together.  And there was something uncomfortable pressing into his back.  As awareness came back to him piece by piece, he froze before gently extricating himself from Shepard's hold.  

Somehow during the night, they'd ended up wrapped up around each other, blanket discarded on the floor and game pieces all over the place (including one of the letter holders that had wedged itself in his back, right under his ribs).  He only managed to get his arm out from under Shepard before she shifted in her sleep, the hold her legs had on his own tightening in a deadlock.

Well, fuck.  

Because this was... this was a window into something Garrus wasn't ever going to get.  Waking up next to Shepard, her wrapped snugly around him (as if he were in any way comfortable for her soft, human form) and her scent embedding itself in his bedding.  And that was half the problem - when she woke up and awkwardly left his bed, he'd be left with the lingering reminder of this night for at least a few days.  

A few days with more fodder for this unrequited pining bullshit he apparently wasn't getting over any time soon.  

He stayed like that for a few minutes, watching her and soaking in the moment, before deciding any longer would just be creepy (and an exercise in self-torture).  So he extracted himself, this time not nearly as careful.  In fact, he made a point of jostling the bed more and pulling his legs out a bit more roughly than needed, just to be sure the movement would wake her up.  

It did.  

"Hmmmmnnnghh." The noise brought forth the reminder that their translators must still be off, because usually her full body stretches were accompanied by the added resonance of subvocals (though they did nothing to make her sound any more dignified during her morning stretches). He waited until her sleepy gaze was on him before he very deliberately turned his back on.  Rubbing sleep from her eyes, she grunted and did the same.

"Morning, Shepard."

"Mornin'." She yawned, showing off the dull teeth that always made Garrus wonder how exactly humans became apex predators on their planet.  "Sleep well?"  

She was teasing him, he knew, so he put in as much ribbing as he could when he quipped back, "As well as can be expected with a 60 kilo weight trying to strangle me."

Her dopey smile faded a bit into confusion, then quickly made reappearance (though some of the light had gone out of it).  "Sorry, you were just the warmest thing around I guess."  To prove her point, she reached over the edge of the bed and grabbed his blanket.  Shaking off the scattered letter tiles, she got off the bed and started folding it. "We still on house arrest?  I wanna run to the dining hall and eat, I'm starving."

Garrus checked his messages. "Looks like we're no longer restricted to our rooms but we can't leave the dorms until 07:00.  We're doing breakfasts in shifts to keep the numbers down, and there aren't classes today."

"Sweet." Normally Shepard was all about her coursework, throwing herself into it because not only did she excel at it but thoroughly enjoyed it.  He shot her a questioning look and she shrugged.  "I was supposed to have an exam today and it's not like I studied last night."  She poked around her stuff and found some clothes and her toiletry bag.  "I'm gonna take a shower.  If I'm not done in time, you can head down without me."

Huh.  They pretty much _always_ went to breakfast together.  Even if one of them was running late.  He mentally cataloged their interactions from the previous night and this morning, trying to pinpoint what had changed to make Shepard seem to want to get away from him.  Maybe that was it - they'd spent a solid 15 uninterrupted hours together and she'd had her Garrus quota for a while.  Mildly depressing, but plausible.

As he changed into something that wasn't so wrinkled, he wondered if he should be mildly offended by Shepard's hasty departure.  Guess there were some things that even the translators couldn't help him figure out...


End file.
